


Happy Birthday to Horned Monsters

by nic_takes_Ls (nic_L)



Category: DreamSMP, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: 5x5 world, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Divergence, Gen, Glowsquid, HAHAHAHAHAHHA HORNBUR SKIN GO BRRR, Hornbur, Hurt/Comfort, Hybrids, Identity Reveal, Implied Betrayal, Lava Rises, Lights, L’Manberg doesn’t blow up, Manberg-Pogtopia War on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), Milo the Fish - Freeform, Not Canon Compliant, Ram Hybrid Jschlatt, Ram Hybrid Wilbur, References to Wilbur’s past Videos, Sky Gods - Freeform, Suicidal Intent, Sunsets, Themes of Canonical Suicide Plans, Time Skips, Unbetaed we die like Wilbur’s computer, Wilbur Soot-centric, Wilbur and Schlatt are twins, glatt, pog - Freeform, small blood warning, twins au, ’Inevitably’
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:13:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28040694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nic_L/pseuds/nic_takes_Ls
Summary: “Does anyone have any- any healing potions?” He asks the circle of wide eyes watching him lay Schlatt’s head in his lap.“Wilbur, you can’t just- Wilbur- I-” Tommy’s hands are tangled in his hair and he has a pleading expression, confusion warring with anger warring with worry.Wilbur reaches an unsteady hand to his beanie and pulls it off, pulls his constant thick fringe away from his face.“Please.”Multiple gasps steak the air from the room, and there’s stillness as Wilbur hunches over his twin’s body, Schlatt’s breaths soft and fading and his eyes wide in shock.
Relationships: Wilbur Soot & Jschlatt, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 42
Kudos: 576





	Happy Birthday to Horned Monsters

Schlatt tugs on Wilbur’s yellow sleeve, Wilbur nearly tripping over his own feet and giggling all the way. They run to the other end of the underground room and Wilbur’s pulled up the stairs at a break-neck pace.

“Schlatt, slow down, I’m going to trip!”

The words are hardly audible over Schlatt’s own laughter and as suddenly as he had yanked Wilbur up from his seat on the floor, they stop in front of an oak tree adorned with a sign reading ‘tred’.

  
“Oh. Hullo, Tred!”

  
Wilbur waves at Tred and then turns to Schlatt, who rolls his eyes and begrudgingly gives in.

  
“Hullo, Tred. Now follow me!”

  
Once more, Wilbur is pulled behind the blue-sweatered boy to the edge of the blue-ribboned border of their small world and to the tiny pond. Schlatt’s moved their jukebox next to it and he drops Wilbur’s wrist from his hand and then the needle onto Ward.

  
The record crackles to life and a quick funeral march passes into a lulling melody that makes Wilbur’s lips pull into a smile. Schlatt walks back to his side and grins. Wilbur has to look up to meet Schlatt’s eyes now and it’s incredibly unfair, but the look of anticipation in Schlatt’s brown eyes makes him wait to whine about that until later.

  
“What?” He shoves his shoulder into Schlatt’s side and Schlatt makes a huff and flicks one fluffy ear.

  
“Okay, you’re going to have to wait, but-” Schlatt gestures for Wilbur to sit and leans over the back of the jukebox, attempting to picking up something, short tail nearly wagging.

  
Wilbur sits cross-legged and leans to the side, head nearly brushing the ground and squinting.

  
“I don’t have my glasses on. What’re you doing?”

  
“Shuddup.” Schlatt finally appears to grab- whatever he wanted, and quickly turns around, hands behind his back.

  
Wilbur sits back up straight, and Schlatt steps forwards slowly. The ram-horned boy looks behind himself at the sky past the border, which is turning watercolour shades of pink and orange in the dying sunlight. The sun slips its last past the horizon, sky pooling into purples and blue as Schlatt sits beside Wilbur, knees touching and so close to the pond that if they stretched their legs they could stand in the water.

  
“Alright. Wilbur!” Schlatt puffs up his chest and tilts his head up, looking everything like a regal figure about to present an award ~~(to Wilbur, at least.)~~

  
The shadows around them elongate, the fading orange gleam of the sun dappling through Tred’s leaves and over the pond.

  
“It is your birthday. So, like people- with, uh, birthdays do, I am giving you a present.”

  
Wilbur shifts to his knees and reaches into his pocket, cool metal touching his fingertips.

  
“Uh. Me too. Happy birthday, Schlatt. Here.”

  
Wilbur quickly drops his gift into Schlatt’s startled but quick cupped hands. It’s a small oval-shaped disc of gold, shakily made, and engraved with a S.

  
“You always like to talk about- Schlattcoin, or whatever it is, so I tried to make one.”

  
Wilbur leans over and picks up the leather cord on the coin.

  
“And you can wear it. As a necklace, if you’d like.” Wilbur feels so tentative, somehow, over this gift. But he and Schlatt had only read about Birthdays a week ago and planned their first for today, and Wilbur wants it to be special.

  
Schlatt is silent, and Wilbur’s breath hitches in his throat, but Schlatt tugs the necklace over his head after maneuvering it past his horns.

  
The blue-sweatered boy doesn’t say anything, but reaches behind himself and pulls a glowing jaw from his back.

  
The world around them is dark enough for whatever Schlatt holds to illuminate their faces, make out the warm crease of Schlatt’s eyes.

  
“Happy birthday, Wilbur.”

  
The lid comes off the jar, and inside is water and- some green-blue gleaming things, and Schlatt pours them into the pond.

  
The strange flowy creatures spread out in the water, and Wilbur is stunned-shocked, eyes wide and lips parted, a hand outstretched to almost brush the top of the pond’s surface.

  
“Wh-what are those?”

  
Wilbur’s voice is hushed and Schlatt makes a pleased noise.

  
“You like them?” His voice is similarly gentle, and excited.

  
“Of course.”

  
“They’re glowsquids. I found them in a pocket of water in the mine.

  
“Oh.”

  
Wilbur remains on his knees, staring unblinkingly at the swimming squids, glow cast over his body and brighter than the stars.

  
“You can lean over and look at them, you know.”

  
With a shuffle and pushing the empty jar to the side, Wilbur leans over the pool of now almost shimmering water, and feels Schlatt move beside him.

  
Wilbur then notices Schlatt’s reflection in the water, a giant smile and light giving his horns curled around his head a sheen. Schlatt flicks an ear, noticing Wilbur’s gaze on his mirror image, and Wilbur then looks at his, his own gentle smile and curls nearly covering his eyes.

  
Looks at his own matching set of fur-tipped ears and horns spiraling around his ears.

  
Wilbur leans back and Schlatt follows, and the twins laugh and thud their horns together, slipping into a hug halfway through.

  
“Thank you, Schlatt,” Wilbur breathes into his brother’s ear, and feels Schlatt’s arms tighten around him.

  
“You too, Wil.”

“Happy birthday, Wilbur.”

  
He splays himself beside Milo’s tank, wind whistling in his ears like it is wont to do, always, forever, until Wilbur dies and goes to sleep. The terracotta is cold and hard against his back, grounding. He lays face to the open air, breeze cutting his skin and numbing his fingers. The sky is of course endless, stars so faint and inconsequential and like him, once bright and smiling and now cold and expiring.

  
Fuck, he’s getting maudlin.

  
Wilbur turns his head to the side, to Milo’s tank, where the fish in question swims unceasingly, coral glittering in the refracted light of the sea pickled in the corner.

  
Wilbur imagines his horns are glittering in the sheen of the glowing plant, knows the pink, shiny, still healing and ugly scar covering half of his face and rest of his body is shining yellow in the gleam. He notices how his distorted reflection, with the curls and twisting horns crowning his head looks like-

  
Him.

  
A memory of magma and heat and searing, blurring pain; a twin smile becoming stretched impossibly wide and a vice grip around his wrists, wrestling him back and down, and down down down.

  
Wilbur’s scars make a ghostly twinge and he turns from the light.

  
He flickers his gaze to the golden pick laying beside his boot on the floor and sits up.

  
Takes it in hand and contemplates the sharpened edge.

  
Brings it up to his face, grabs the side of his horn, and swings-

There’s a clatter on the ground and a dull aching pain in Wilbur’s buzzing, blurring head. He lifts the hand not wrapped tight around the pick’s handle to his head, and asides from the wet red trickling down his fingers, he feels fine. 

  
Moments later the other horn lands on the ground and is kicked off into the endless sky. 

  
Wilbur’s head feels much lighter. 

In the Camarvan, the now decrypt and tattered metal shell of a home, there is an army, all swathed in shimmering purple runes and unnatural glints on their swords, and their weapons are held low and loose.

  
There is a man sitting cross legged on the floor, gazing pensively at a wet, glittering, bottle in his hand.

  
There are more on the floor.

  
The man is not easily seen as such, more a monster with his halo of twisting dark horns and furred ears, one of which has an age-old scar like claws through it. His short-shorn hair isn’t gelled into place as usual, and there’s curls in his hair that haven’t been seen in years. His amber eyes are bleary and he’s staring at the ground with an empty expression. He doesn’t look up as more soldiers stare down from the skylights.

  
The sight makes Wilbur’s stomach hurt, his chest burn, his fingers tremble in an instinctive reach that’s only held by years of scars left on his ~~heart~~ back. 

  
“Schlatt,” He calls, the only armourless one asides from the President. There’s a reason for both of them.

  
It’s the same reason. Wilbur just didn’t know Schlatt wanted it too. 

  
Schlatt looks up and a sneer rises to his face.

  
“What the hell is this, a surprise birthday party?”

  
The words give Wilbur shudders down his spine, flashes of memories of ponds and lights and horns, and he knows he’s flinched.

  
“What are you doing in my drug van?”

  
Schlatt finally looks up and his eyes lock with Wilbur’s. They hold for an unceasing moment, hardly noticing the crowd’s collective held breath, and then Schlatt raises the bottle in his hands to his lips and tilts his head back.

  
“Schlatt?” Quackity’s voice betrays his bewilderment, and he lets his already loose grip on his sword drop.

  
“Is he-” Tubbo begins, and Fundy takes up the rest of the sentence.

  
“Are you drinking?!”

  
Schlatt doesn’t answer, finishes the bottle in his hand before letting it drop from his fingers and roll until it hits Wilbur’s boot. 

  
“Yeah. I’m drunk.” He says, something desperate and yet uncaring in his voice, but it makes Wilbur’s pulse spike and his heart race even more than it’s been since he woke up and watched the sun rise for what is supposed to be the last time.

  
Wilbur begins to search around the crowded room, the only way to see in shafts of light from the skylights.

  
Tommy makes one impassioned snark and others follow up with angry questions, but then there’s a tug on Wilbur’s sleeve from Niki, who noticed his blank stare in the shadows of a corner.

  
Wilbur jerks away from Niki’s grip and to the corner of the van, picks up a small object, and when he turns, the entire room is staring at him and Schlatt’s eyes darken, face turn quickly sullen.

  
“What’s that?” Techno’s voice, however monotone, is sharp with suspicion and it’s clear he knows.

  
Wilbur walks forwards and past the gathered crowd. He drops to his knees in front of Schlatt, and holds out the empty syringe.

  
His hands are shaking, breath stuttering, and as he talks his voice cracks like one of those glass bottles littered on the floor.

  
“Schlatt?”

  
“Wilbur.”

  
The horned man looks defeated, not in the way of one who’s lost his crown, lost a battle, lost a war, but one crushed by the way Wilbur’s now wet eyes bore into his.

  
Wilbur makes a shattered sob, and Tommy jerks forwards only to watch Wilbur slump into Schlatt’s arms.

  
Tubbo makes a pained noise, and tugs Tommy back.

  
“I think- I think that’s a syringe, Tommy.”

  
Wilbur hardly hears anything over the rush in his ears. He draws himself back from Schlatt’s weakening grip and begins searching his inventory for- anything, really.

  
“Does anyone have any- any healing potions?” He asks the circle of wide eyes watching him lay Schlatt’s head in his lap.

  
~~He didn’t bring any potions at all because he half-hoped he would die in combat.~~

  
“Wilbur, you can’t just- Wilbur- I-” Tommy’s hands are tangled in his hair and he has a pleading expression, confusion warring with anger warring with worry.

  
“I thought that Schlatt was the _bad guy._ ” Badboyhalo speaks up, an unexpected voice. “He and Dream surrendered. Why are we not letting him- you know. Die?”

  
Murmurs of agreement are soft but echo in Wilbur’s ears.

  
He drops his head, stares at the dusty concrete he kneels upon.

  
“I- I was going to blow up L’Manberg. Regardless of whether we won or lost.”

  
The silence is deafening in the wake of his whisper.

  
“I- I’m the traitor.”

  
Wilbur slowly begins to reach up to his head, tugs down his hood covering his beanie.

  
“I was going to kill myself, after blowing everything up. That’s why I didn’t wear armour. I didn’t bring potions.” 

Schlatt suddenly squeezes Wilbur’s wrist tight, and Wilbur’s breath hitches. His eyes are cloudy but Wilbur knows he’s furious.

  
Wilbur flicks his wet and bleary eyes up to horrified faces, Niki’s, Tommy’s, and Tubbo’s with shiny streaks down their cheeks, Techno’s stunned wide gaze, ( ~~he’ known about the bombs, most of the plan, but not Wilbur’s final steps~~ ) Fundy suddenly gripping Quackity’s shoulder in a quick bid to stay upright.

  
Wilbur lets tears roll down his jaw, as he rambles, broken and hurried and tripping over his words.

  
“I won’t- I won’t do anything. I’ll sit and not touch the button- you can disarm it, there’s 11 stacks of TNT under L’Manberg, it would be a good idea- Under the podium. Just please don’t let Schlatt die.”

  
Wilbur reaches an unsteady hand to his beanie and pulls it off, pulls his constant thick fringe away from his face, and his long ears, finally uncovered, twitch. His hand nudges against his short blunt horns.

  
“ _Please_.”

  
Multiple gasps steal the air from the room, and there’s stillness as Wilbur hunches over his twin’s body, Schlatt’s breaths soft and fading and his eyes wide in shock.

  
“You- Wilbur?” Tommy steps close and crouches to the floor, places a hand on Wilbur’s shoulder. “You-” He keeps cutting himself off, afraid to insinuate and afraid to be right.

  
“He was- he’s my twin brother.”

  
Tommy doesn’t move for a second, but then Wilbur feels Tommy’s arm brush against him as a pop of a potion cork echoes in the quiet.

  
“Thank you.” Wilbur’s voice breaks.

  
Tommy pours the red liquid down Schlatt’s throat, and there’s shuffles of footsteps leaving the van, most likely to remove the planted bombs under the entirety of the city.

  
In the corner of Wilbur’s eye, Fundy gives a horrified hiccup in his throat and shakes his head weakly before following Niki’s and Eret’s gesture, more following until only Techno still remains.

  
Tommy reaches for Wilbur’s shoulder and slides closer, bringing his head to bump gently against the side of Wilbur’s. 

  
“Wilbur, it- he’s going to be fine. We’re going to be fine, alright?”

  
Wilbur breaks into an open sob and his tears fall into Schlatt’s hair and his face is hidden in Tommy’s shoulder before long.

  
Techno’s heeled footsteps are heard getting closer and then there’s another hand cradling his head, carding through his curls with worn warm fingers. A thumb comes up and rests on the nape of his neck. Schlatt’s previously strained breathing slowly eases and becomes stronger, steadier. The four sit on the cool concrete floor and do not speak.

  
The sunlight shining through the Camarvan dims eventually, only weak dying rays are visible from the windows and the sky is a shade of orange Wilbur only sees once a year.

A sudden whoosh of wings beating the air turns the heads of the three still awake figures, not bothering to shift away from each other, arms and legs and torsos entangled. 

  
A great shadow appears in the shadow of the door, and boots click on the cement. 

  
“Phil.” Techno softly calls, gestures to the nearly unresponsive shape of Wilbur leaning into his chest, still clutching onto Schlatt. 

  
“I- Tubbo told me- What happened. I guess.” Phil steps around them and Tommy lifts his head from Wilbur’s back. 

  
Wilbur makes a soft snuffle in his sleep, familiar in how odd, almost inhuman it was, but it’s easy to understand how he never was human, always slightly too odd and alike Techno in their group of friends. 

  
Phil’s eyes flicker from Wilbur’s brown speckled ears to his horns and finally his entire frame curling around his-

  
Twin’s.

  
It’s somehow so easy to see the similarities in the two leaders now, their shared frame of their faces and hair getting caught in their dark lashes. 

  
“So Wilbur was going to blow himself and L’Manberg up.” Philza looks back to Techno’s face for final confirmation. 

  
Techno nods. 

  
“Schlatt’s his twin.” Tommy’s tired voice cracks over the words. 

  
“Let them sleep. We can talk in the morning.” Phil sits on the floor and drapes his wings over his huddle of tired figures.

  
The sun sets.

  
It has been a year, another November 16th, since war and exiles and madness and bombs nearly scarred the earth. 

  
Now, Wilbur tugs Schlatt by the sleeve, taller than the last time and with a smile on his face. His eyes are not rimmed by purple, hair not matted and dull, his fingers do not shake and his horns are a crown, a halo rimmed golden by the sunshine against his back. 

  
He’s finally managed to get him and Schlatt away from their friends, and they are running through the woods along a path tread in the land by their own feet. 

  
Schlatt gives a laugh, begrudgingly letting his younger twin pull him along to the clearing. 

  
There in the clearing, of course, is a pond.

  
It is much bigger than the one from years ago shaded by Tred, and as the brothers step into the cool water, ripples catch the fading sun’s beams and glitter.

  
Wilbur lets the sky turn a brilliant shade of red before turning to Schlatt.

  
He opens his mouth and Schlatt shoves a palm over his face.

  
“Shuddup. We both know what we’re doing here, Wilbur. Now take my shitty present and give me yours.”

  
Wilbur gives a helplessly happy giggle, and the faux sneer on Schlatt’s face as he does only makes it worse. When he recovers, he reaches up and pulls on Schlatt’s shoulders till their horns bump and closes his eyes. 

  
Schlatt pats his shoulder before pushing away, and begins to pull something out of his backpack he’d brought. 

  
It’s a round glowing pearl, almost, blue and green and the glass inside is filled with swirling water in which a small glowsquid give it the sheen it bears. 

  
Wilbur makes a tiny hiccup of a gasp and pulls a shape from its hiding place in a hollow of a tree nearby. 

  
His is a paper lantern, painstakingly pieced together in the form of-

  
A glowsquid.

  
It’s lit and Wilbur feels the weightlessness of it gently insist upon his fingers. 

  
“I- I’d gotten you-“

  
Wilbur stutters, and then he blinks and his face is tucked between Schlatt’s horn and his cheek, furred ear brushing against his nose.

  
He sighs, a happy noise, and the stars inevitably appear in the dark sky, and their lights inevitably cast a glow to their faces, and the twins let one light float to the sky and one stay in their hands, and one brother thinks silently that this, too, must have been inevitable, ending as it started. 

  
He says, aloud, “Well, happy birthday to horned monsters, I guess.” 

  
His brother laughs.

**Author's Note:**

> Howdy!!! You can probably tell but Wilbur and Schlatt + Sky Gods are my favourite brainrot :)
> 
> ALSO JOIN WRITER’S BLOCK DISCORD ITS FUN AND THE NAME IS A MINECRAFT PUN OWO
> 
> https://discord.gg/w9CwSK26mm


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